Huge leak exposes elite's tax havens

[lgfualol]

http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/56febff0a1bb8d3c3495adf4/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-35918844

https://panamapapers.icij.org/the_power_players/

https://panamapapers.icij.org/20160403-panama-papers-global-overview.html

11.5 million documents. A lot of trousers will be shat, Iceland PM was involved, Putin, etc. Even Ulloa was involved a few years ago.

Could have a huge impact on things, or swept under the carpet.

[Benji]

Excellent.  Should sweep the doping links under a big Panamanian rug 

[Larry_LCFC]

Ulloa? I've never trusted him with that bumfluff on his chin.

[Alf Bentley]

Ulloa? I've never trusted him with that bumfluff on his chin.

 

 

Ulloa part of an elite using tax havens?! 

 

Last season, I bumped into him with his family, travelling 2nd class London-Leicester. Naturally, I assumed he must be some sort of Argentine populist revolutionary not to be travelling 1st class on his pay (not to mention sporting trendy "Che" bumfluff).

 

But maybe all his cash was tied up in a tax haven and he's too much of a skinflint to cough up for 1st class? 

[lgfualol]

Ulloa part of an elite using tax havens?!

Last season, I bumped into him with his family, travelling 2nd class London-Leicester. Naturally, I assumed he must be some sort of Argentine populist revolutionary not to be travelling 1st class on his pay (not to mention sporting trendy "Che" bumfluff).

But maybe all his cash was tied up in a tax haven and he's too much of a skinflint to cough up for 1st class?

It's not just elites I think but it's got a lot of elites. It was when Ulloa was playing in Argentina or something, probably just as normal over there to tax evade as here.

Here is something from the Irish Times:

"Leonardo Ulloa, a top scorer for Leicester City, the surprise team of the season for fans of the Premier League.

In early 2008, when he was playing for San Lorenzo de Almagro in Argentina, Leo Ulloa signed over his economic and image rights to Jump Drive Sport Rights LLC, a company registered in New York.

On paper, Jump Drive’s director and shareholder weren’t people but instead two companies based in the South Pacific nation of Samoa. Jump Drive’s power of attorney was held by José Manuel García Osuna, a businessman and soccer administrator who is now facing fraud charges in Spain, including an allegation that he pocketed a large percentage of the money that Ulloa was supposed to receive for his image rights as well as for his signing contracts to move from one team to another.

Ulloa declined to discuss his image rights agreement or his dealings with Osuna. “I don’t have a good relationship with him now, but I don’t want to talk about it,” Ulloa said in a brief telephone interview.

Osuna told ICIJ that he didn’t incorporate Jump Drive and he didn’t sign Ulloa’s image rights contract. He said he negotiated Ulloa’s signing with the Spanish club CD Castellón but he “did not bill a single cent to the club in exchange for my services.”

[m4DD0gg]

http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/56febff0a1bb8d3c3495adf4/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-35918844

https://panamapapers.icij.org/the_power_players/

https://panamapapers.icij.org/20160403-panama-papers-global-overview.html

11.5 million documents. A lot of trousers will be shat, Iceland PM was involved, Putin, etc. Even Ulloa was involved a few years ago.

Could have a huge impact on things, or swept under the carpet.

 

Fair play to them.

[Alf Bentley]

It's not just elites I think but it's got a lot of elites. It was when Ulloa was playing in Argentina or something, probably just as normal over there to tax evade as here.

Here is something from the Irish Times:

"Leonardo Ulloa, a top scorer for Leicester City, the surprise team of the season for fans of the Premier League.

In early 2008, when he was playing for San Lorenzo de Almagro in Argentina, Leo Ulloa signed over his economic and image rights to Jump Drive Sport Rights LLC, a company registered in New York.

On paper, Jump Drive’s director and shareholder weren’t people but instead two companies based in the South Pacific nation of Samoa. Jump Drive’s power of attorney was held by José Manuel García Osuna, a businessman and soccer administrator who is now facing fraud charges in Spain, including an allegation that he pocketed a large percentage of the money that Ulloa was supposed to receive for his image rights as well as for his signing contracts to move from one team to another.

Ulloa declined to discuss his image rights agreement or his dealings with Osuna. “I don’t have a good relationship with him now, but I don’t want to talk about it,” Ulloa said in a brief telephone interview.

Osuna told ICIJ that he didn’t incorporate Jump Drive and he didn’t sign Ulloa’s image rights contract. He said he negotiated Ulloa’s signing with the Spanish club CD Castellón but he “did not bill a single cent to the club in exchange for my services.”

 

Cheers.

 

If this allegedly fraudulent "soccer administrator" has pocketed a lot of Leo's dosh, maybe that explains why he was slumming it in the 2nd class carriage!

[Buce]

In other news, the Pope has revealed a leaning towards Catholicism..

[David Guiza]

A particular highlight for me was this..

 

^{Ukraine's president took time out on the same day Russia attacked the country to look for a utility bill to send Mossack Fonseca}

 

^{During the height of the violence in Ukraine in 2014, newly elected President Petro Poroshenko announced on September 1st that Russia had openly attacked the country. He also took the time on the same day to send Mossack Fonseca a copy of a utility bill to prove his home address.}

 

[Strokes]

In other news, the Pope has revealed a leaning towards Catholicism..

Dont believe everything you read.

[Alf Bentley]

Dont believe everything you read.

 

 

Pope Francis been shitting in the woods again, has he?

[Buce]

Dont believe everything you read.

It saw it on Twitter.

It must be true.

[Buce]

Pope Francis been shitting in the woods again, has he?

Bearing his arse in public?

[Rincewind]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/david-cameron-father-and-senior-tory-figures-named-in-panama-papers-leak-a6967116.html

 

https://beastrabban.wordpress.com/2016/03/11/private-eye-on-lord-rothermeres-ownership-of-london-property-in-offshore-accounts/

.

If one of us was a few days late with filling in a tax form they would be on our backs in a shot.

 

But I expect a perfectly reasonable explanation will be forthcoming to vindicate all those involved.

Anyway in a day or so the headlines will be 'TERROR THREATS TO THE UK RUN FOR YOUR LIFE.' and all this will be forgotten.

 

[Jon the Hat]

This sort of shit is exactly why low tax rates earn a country more tax income.  The higher the tax rate in the UK , the more room there is to pay advisers like these to build tax efficient corporate structures, especially if like a lot of these guys, you have a global financial investment portfolio.  There is always a country willing to charge you less to be tax resident there.

[Rincewind]

I have done it myself, put a few quid out of my £70 JSA in an offshore account so as to receive more benefits. It is not their fault they cannot manage.

[SMX11]

This sort of shit is exactly why low tax rates earn a country more tax income. The higher the tax rate in the UK , the more room there is to pay advisers like these to build tax efficient corporate structures, especially if like a lot of these guys, you have a global financial investment portfolio. There is always a country willing to charge you less to be tax resident there.

25% flat tax would do it for me and no NI jobs tax.

[MC Prussian]

Iceland's prime minister Gunnlaugsson crumbles in front of a TV camera, asked about his offshore company.

 

Iceland's voters are now calling for a snap election:

http://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/iceland-pm-calls-snap-election-offshore-revelations

[lgfualol]

Iceland's prime minister Gunnlaugsson crumbles in front of a TV camera, asked about his offshore company.

 

Iceland's voters are now calling for a snap election:

http://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/iceland-pm-calls-snap-election-offshore-revelations

 

Omg that was great to watch. What a little weasel. 

[Carl the Llama]

Bit harsh on the noble weasel there.  Look how sweet and majestic they are:

 

More of a Fowler's Toad if you ask me.

[Alf Bentley]

This sort of shit is exactly why low tax rates earn a country more tax income.  The higher the tax rate in the UK , the more room there is to pay advisers like these to build tax efficient corporate structures, especially if like a lot of these guys, you have a global financial investment portfolio.  There is always a country willing to charge you less to be tax resident there.

 

 

As you say, though, "there is always a country willing to charge you less to be tax resident there". There's no way that we can compete on tax with, say, the Cayman Islands or Liechtenstein, as they have very small populations and very low social costs so need very little tax revenue for their systems to be viable. The only way that we could compete would be to stop funding the NHS and schools, disband our armed forces and stop paying out most pensions / benefits - or, at least, do most of those things. In other words, we'd need to almost abandon human civilisation.

 

Of course, there's always the alternative of making it harder for tax havens to massively undercut our tax rates. Is there really the political will for that, though, given the close connections between commercial, social and political elites? If the will was there, surely some sort of compromise deal could be done so as to ensure that countries currently operating as tax havens remained economically viable, while not helping to boost ballooning inequality in the developed world? As these are mostly small states, the developed world would have the political muscle to overcome unreasonable obstruction....but do its governing class have the will to do more than make a few token gestures?

 

I've quickly checked a few sites re. the revenue impact of the 50% v 45% top rate. The findings seem rather unclear but suggest that neither increasing the rate to 50% nor cutting it to 45% had much impact on revenue.

If the upper and top tax rates were equalised with the standard rate at 25%, would there really be a disproportionately large influx of capital currently based in tax havens....or would many stick with the even lower tax haven rates?  

 

If slashing tax rates led to a fall in revenues (entirely possible, even if some investments came back on-shore and there was less tax avoidance), how much social distress, public squalor and crime would our society be prepared to tolerate? Do we want to end up with gilded, gated communities alongside favelas whose inhabitants are seen as disposable, sub-human scum by some? Even if a rich man has barbed wire around his mansion, security guards on the gates and a helipad, does he want to know that communities like that exist in his country and to run the risk of his family falling victim to violent crime and kidnapping for ransom as in certain Latin American countries? We already have increasing rates of inequality. How far do we want that to go?

 

There's always a balancing act. During the "Celtic Tiger" years, Ireland attracted loads of investment by foreign I.T. firms. They were partly attracted by low rates of corporation tax, no doubt, but high levels of education and I.T. literacy were also reckoned to play a big part....and someone has to pay for that education.  Would Brits investing in tax havens do so if they were obliged to spend most of their time physically living in the Caymans or Liechtenstein? Only a few would do so, I presume.

 

Of course, we all want public/social spending to be efficient. But even if it was 100% efficient, having any sort of an advanced civilisation costs a lot, even if you privatise some of the social provision - and someone has got to pay. Or would it be just as acceptable if all employees came up with some scheme to avoid PAYE and all small businesses did likewise to avoid corporation tax, business rates, income tax and N.I.?  

[Buce]

Cameron's father had his snout in the trough:

http://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/04/panama-papers-david-cameron-father-tax-bahamas

[Trav Le Bleu]

Rich people avoid taxes shocker.

[Steameh]

This sort of shit is exactly why low tax rates earn a country more tax income.  The higher the tax rate in the UK , the more room there is to pay advisers like these to build tax efficient corporate structures, especially if like a lot of these guys, you have a global financial investment portfolio.  There is always a country willing to charge you less to be tax resident there.

 

This isn't always true, the US State of Kansas is in real real trouble at the moment because the governer slashed the tax rates on the richest and big businesses and the state is now pretty much bankrupt.

[MC Prussian]

This sort of shit is exactly why low tax rates earn a country more tax income.  The higher the tax rate in the UK , the more room there is to pay advisers like these to build tax efficient corporate structures, especially if like a lot of these guys, you have a global financial investment portfolio.  There is always a country willing to charge you less to be tax resident there.

 

The thing is, you can argue against whatever taxation you want, there will always be people trying to exploit loopholes because they think they pay too much, don't want to pay that much anymore or evade tax altogether.

 

Taxation isn't the problem per se, it's tax evasion and allowing companies like the one in Panama and the industry they represent to continue to flourish.